Acting Attorney General Andrew J. Bruck announced that an inactive correctional police officer for the New Jersey Juvenile Justice Commission (JJC) was criminally charged today for allegedly using unjustified force and breaking the wrist of a male resident at the JJC Juvenile Medium Security Facility in Bordentown. According to Acting Attorney General Bruck, Lt. Edward Day, 52, of Paulsboro, who worked as a correctional police officer at the JJC Juvenile Medium Security Facility, was charged with aggravated assault by the Attorney General’s Office of Public Integrity and Accountability (OPIA).
The charge results from an investigation by the OPIA Corruption Bureau and JJC’s Office of Investigations. On October 25, 2020, Lt. Day and other correctional police officers were escorting a 16-year-old juvenile resident from his room to another location in the facility, with his arms handcuffed behind his back, when Day, without apparent cause or justification, allegedly grabbed the victim’s ankle from behind, pulled his leg back, and pushed him face-forward onto the ground, Acting Attorney General Bruck said.
Day then allegedly grabbed hold of the juvenile’s handcuffed wrists and twisted and broke one of them.
Third-degree charges carry a sentence of three to five years in state prison and a criminal fine of up to $15,000. The charge is merely an accusation and the defendant is presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty in a court of law.